When a property owner is away from his home, business or other location where he spends a predictable amount of time either short term or long, his property, both real and personal are subject to occurrences and events that, if left unaddressed, can result in damage thereto and/or the surroundings.
Conditions can arise which may threaten the owner's property or result in a condition or circumstance which can prejudice the owner's safety upon his return.
Of course, numerous alarm and warning systems exist. These typically will alert a property owner to an associated condition generally occurring within the premises, such as fire, carbon monoxide leakage and the like. Their effectiveness, in terms of immediate response, many times, is premised on the property owner being on location at the time of the occurrence. Other systems are wired in a manner that a communication link to emergency providers is enabled so that they can respond in as timely a fashion as the circumstances allow. These systems generally include a central monitoring capability. The system is set up such that an attempt at some form of “immediate” communication concerning the occurrence can be made to the property owner. Of course, some events, e.g. a burst water pipe, can occur beyond the effective range or capability of the non-visual alarm sensors, albeit on the property so that they go undetected with possible catastrophic results.
Neighbors (including passersby, postal carriers, emergency personnel, utility workers, etc., hereinafter referred to collectively as “neighbor(s)”), may observe these occurrences and will think to contact the property owner. However a neighbor may not be able to do this, particularly if there is no information available to that person which would allow him to contact the individual. Of course, this is especially the case if the observer is a passersby, postal carrier, emergency personnel, utility worker, etc. Further, an event can occur when the property owner is away for only a brief time, for example, on an overnight trip or even when out shopping. Property owners in such cases seldom bother to alert their nearby neighbors to their brief absence from their home or other location.
In some of these situations, where appropriate, the neighbor can call the police or other emergency providers and hopefully these will respond and arrive in time to minimize the consequences of the event. However, absent a prescribed procedure for bringing the matter to the attention of the owner, the latter may not find out about the occurrence until he returns to the location as he originally scheduled. The owner's ability to take affirmative action before he returned is thus precluded.
Further, the neighbor in many circumstances is without knowledge about any alarm system on the premises: i.e., how it is actuated; where the sensors are; and how it might be disabled. In this event, the alarm indicating mechanism or components would continue with their associated audible indications and would continue until the batteries were removed or the power to the circuit, or in the worse case to the location, was disconnected. Of course, this would negate the detection capability of the system going forward, thus potentially jeopardizing the safety of the premises until the owner returns.
Even with these alarm systems in place, as noted above, not all unanticipated activity on a property or its immediate environs will necessarily give rise to an activation of the alarm mechanism. For example, burglars or unwanted persons may enter onto the property or the home. Without motion detectors present, their intrusion will go undetected. Of course, if the detection equipment is not enabled or fails to operate, no automatic detection will occur.
Further occurrences can involve property of the owner on the exterior of the owner's home or at an off-site location within the control of the owner. The property could be located at an owner's business, vacation home, apartment or other location. It could involve the owner's personal property for example, a car, a boat or other water craft or airplane located at a respective marina or airport. Further, the property or well-being of a family member for example, an elderly or disabled parent, a student away at school, a family member at the family vacation home on separate vacation, and so forth, can be protected through utilization of the present invention.
Other occurrences can also require the immediate attention of the owner: a garage or front door accidentally left open; sprinklers left on; milk and newspaper deliveries that were not stopped; packages, goods or dry cleaning delivered and left out for a long time; a potentially unauthorized party (teen, etc.) on the premises and your neighbor does not want to call the police . . . yet; strange car or truck in driveway for extended period of time.
Still other conditions can occur that are not disposed to detection by automatic detectors and alarm systems. These include: children locked out or in need of assistance; elderly family members exhibiting troubling but not life threatening behavior; wandering pet; a family member treated by emergency responders while home alone; power outage in the neighborhood; severe weather conditions; flooding or other water concerns.
Further, in today's environment, people are leery of providing personal identification and contact information to all but a select few. Thus people are protective of their cell phone number, e-mail address and varied social media contact information. This justifiable concern limits the pool of individuals (such as those mentioned above) who under the variety of circumstances noted could initiate the clarion cry that would bring a particular matter to the attention of the owner.
Various notification and warning methods and systems have sought protection for property owners through the US Patent system. Some of the proposed techniques identified are summarized in the following paragraphs.
USPAN 2013\0009749—This application is directed to a neighborhood watch system which includes a plurality of electronic surveillance systems appropriately Geo-Tagged. A network control center is identified to which members of a plurality can communicate an alarm or incident indicating message along with their respective Geo-Tag. This is a relatively complex electronic system.
USPAN 2012/0092161—Reveals a community notification system (CNS) wherein a system user (who lives in a residential neighborhood) might notice suspicious activity while driving past a neighbor's house, sends an event alert (relating to the suspicious activity) to the CNS, and other system users are in turn notified by the CNS. Again, this appears to be a somewhat more complicated system which may not be cost-effectively installed, since in part, it involves contacting all residents in the neighborhood.
USPAN 2006/0131869—Discloses use of a sticker attachable to a building and includes emergency warning indicia to aid alerting others of animals in the need of care and also confirm the location of the animals.
USPAN 2003/0022684—The Abstract discusses a system, method and device for enabling an individual positioned in a first location to be advised of a noteworthy situation in a second location of interest thereby enabling an individual to take appropriate action to prevent potential loss of property and/or life. Again, a somewhat sophisticated warning system is disclosed.
U.S. Pat. No. 8,364,115—The Abstract discusses an anonymous hazardous condition alert system and process which enables individuals to alert property owners of potentially hazardous conditions associated with their property. An alerting user, upon viewing a hazardous condition, locates a telephone number on a sign disposed proximate to the property in question and calls the telephone number to be connected to a hazardous condition alert system.
U.S. Pat. No. 7,808,378—An alert notification system and method for neighborhoods is discussed.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,778,084—A surveillance and security system adapted to be applicable to a single premise is discussed.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,686,886—A neighborhood watch circuit is discussed wherein the occurrence of an emergency event can be identified by a member of the neighborhood watch circuit and through an electronic alert unit, transmit to an appropriate emergency service provider the occurrence of the event and its location as well as advise the property owner affected by the emergency event.